Crunching Our Numbers, New and Improved

Some of us have been noticing for a while that a part of the General Assembly website has been down: that part that allows access to 10-year statistics on congregations. For years, it’s been a reliable, workhorse portion of the website: data on membership gains and losses, financial income and the like.

A few weeks ago, abruptly and without prior notice, that functionality disappeared. After checking back a couple of times, I inquired of some folks in our national office and was told that the statistics part of the website was being extensively revised and improved. It was “under construction.”

Now, the results of that improvement are on display. The new site is impressive. It’s so much easier to make sense of the statistics now. It’s also possible to crunch the numbers in new and different combinations that may prove useful.

Clerks of session will be especially interested to see these improvements, which are the results of the annual statistical reporting process you engage in each January.

 Check out your congregation's numbers!

Are We Fish or Scuba Divers?

When it comes to reflecting on the health of congregations, Jim Kitchens is one of the best minds in the PC(USA). A retired pastor of long experience, he "gets it" with respect to the challenges churches are facing.

"It's Not Your Fault" is a little essay he's written, directed at congregational leaders who may be demoralized about AWOL church members and declining financial resources. It will take you just a couple minutes to read it. But it will give you a lot to think about.

"It's not your fault" is what Jim says to congregational leaders he's working with. It's not you, he says. You're doing what's always worked. It's the culture around you that's changed:

"...the culture shifted out from under you. The culture in which you know how to 'be' church is gone, and you haven’t yet figured out how to be the church for the new culture in which you find yourselves.  But the truth is that no one else has, either.”

Reading those remarks, I felt a deep sense of resonance. Yes, that's exactly the situation in the church - and the presbytery - I serve.

A question bubbled up in my mind. If we as the church are swimming in the larger culture, are we doing so as fish, or as scuba divers? In other words, is the water our native environment, or do we really belong to another realm, and have to import our own spiritual life-support?

No doubt, our Lord himself swam in the water of humanity like a fish. That's what the incarnation is all about. But there's some biblical evidence that the church has a somewhat different relationship to the culture.

"But our citizenship is in heaven," Paul says, in Philippians 3:20. "So we are ambassadors for Christ" he also says, in 2 Corinthians 5:20 - again, implying that the deepest aspect of who we are hails from someplace else.

But something seems different today. The in-but-not-of-the-world thing has always been part of the church's experience, but it seems particularly intense at the moment. As a sixty-year-old Baby Boomer, I can vividly recall the days when the church steeple anchored Main Street, and church membership was the norm rather than the exception for most of our neighbors.

Sometimes it seems like we're swimming in a whole new ocean. And the needle on our oxygen gauge is entering the red zone.

Is that your experience, too?

Per Capita: A Seat at the Table for Everyone

Outgoing General Assembly Stated Clerk Gradye Parsons has just written a helpful little piece explaining the importance of per capita. It's something I think every minister or ruling elder should become familiar with, because per capita is among the most-misunderstood features of our common life as Presbyterians.

Per capita has been likened to our denominational utility. It pays essential administrative expenses of higher councils (presbytery, synod and General Assembly). Most of what per capita funds is not very exciting to talk about. It's business-as-usual type of stuff, the day-to-day overhead connected with keeping church governance working for all Presbyterians.

But that doesn't mean it's unimportant. Without the vital work that goes on at presbytery, synod and General Assembly, we'd be a motley collection of individual congregations, with little in the way of resources or communication. There would be no structures to carry out global mission. There would be no help forthcoming for congregations who get into difficulty.

One of the striking things Gradye says in the article is that "Per capita makes the table more accessible so all have a seat." This is very true, because it's per capita that pays the expenses of commissioners to synod and General Assembly, as well as those who participate in governance by serving on various committees and working groups. Do we really want to live in a church where only those with the personal funds for travel and lodging are able to participate in governance?

Anyway, there's a lot to think about in Gradye's article. Have a look at it.

While you're doing that, check out this great music video by Carrie Newcomer, "Room At the Table":

The Top 10 Things that Happened at the 222nd General Assembly

Anyone who’s ever been to a General Assembly knows it’s a rich feast. The business agenda of the Assembly alone is massive, and there are a host of auxiliary meetings and social events as well.

Boiling the work of the Assembly down to just a few items is a challenge, but I’m going to try. Here’s my list of the Top 10 Things that Happened at the 222nd General Assembly:

10) The most talked-about business in advance of the Assembly was the "Foothills Overtures," a collection of constitutional amendments and rules changes that would have radically altered the way the Assembly does its business. I’ve written about these overtures — named for the Foothills Presbytery of South Carolina, from which they originated — in an earlier blog post. The effect of these overtures would have been — by restricting how often certain topics could come up and by adding supermajority voting requirements — to eviscerate the Assembly’s ability to do almost anything related to social justice. In the end, the Assembly carefully considered these overtures in a special committee, then resoundingly voted them all down.

9) In the early twentieth century, Presbyterians could be found at the forefront of the Fundamentalist movement, advancing a literalist interpretation of scripture. We are very far from that place a century later, interpreting scripture with the full range of literary and historical tools available. In two separate actions, the Assembly stated definitively that science and faith are not enemies, that evolution — rather than a literal reading of the Genesis creation stories — is a reasonable explanation of how God created the universe, and that Christian disciples should not shrink from using the full range of their God-given intellectual abilities to advance scientific inquiry.

8) Could the “sex wars” really be over? Generally, the atmosphere at this Assembly was far less contentious than some of recent memory. This is largely due to the changes that took place at the last two Assemblies, allowing freedom for GLBTQ believers to assume ordained office, and a similar freedom for pastors and sessions wishing to offer same-sex marriage ceremonies where permitted by civil law. There was an overture to return to the “one man and one woman” language once present in the Directory for Worship’s section on marriage. This was resoundingly defeated by a more than a 4-to-1 margin. Another overture, coming from the opposite end of the theological spectrum, called on the church to formally apologize to GLBTQ Christians who have been marginalized by past church teachings. The Assembly declined to use the emotionally-loaded “a”-word, speaking instead of “regret.” This was in order to provide gracious space for those who continue to be dissent from the church’s tolerant stance on same-sex marriage, honoring their freedom of conscience.

7) After contentious debate, the Assembly rejected a call for aggressive divestment of the church’s stock-market holdings in two hundred corporations that produce fossil fuels. Instead, the Assembly opted for a less-confrontational strategy of engaging these companies in dialogue through stockholder resolutions.

6) The Assembly approved an amended report, “Israel-Palestine: For Human Values in the Absence of a Just Peace.” This supports the two-state solution to that intractable conflict, taking particular note of the imbalance of suffering between the Israelis and the Palestinians. The Assembly refrained from moving beyond phased divestment from Hewlett-Packard (the position of the last Assembly) to an outright boycott, continuing to work with that corporation to encourage them to do less to support the Israeli occupation of Palestinian areas.

5) The last two Assemblies have pondered the future of synods, opting for consolidation of our existing synods into even larger regional bodies — but not specifying exactly how this was going to take place. By a large majority, the Assembly rescinded that mandate. Commissioners approved the appointment of a high-level “2020 Vision Team” that will explore our governance structures at every level and make recommendations for change.

4) In a surprise move, the Assembly resoundingly approved an overture calling for a return to “minister of the word and sacrament” as the prevailing title for the order of ministry that has been called, since the adoption of our present Form of Government, “teaching elder.” Both terms will still be used, but - if a majority of presbyteries approve the change - “minister” will now be primary, as it has been through every other era of the church’s history. I have written about this issue previously in an article in the Presbyterian Outlook. In a related development, the wordy title, “ruling elder commissioned to limited pastoral service” (commonly called “commissioned ruling elder”) will now be called simply “commissioned pastor.”

3) New faces in leadership: for the first time ever, there is no Anglo male face among the senior leadership of the church. The Assembly elected the Revs. T. Denise Anderson and Jan Edmiston (of National Capital and Chicago presbyteries, respectively) as its first-ever co-moderators. It also elected the Rev. J. Herbert Nelson (formerly director of the church’s Washington Office) as Stated Clerk. Tony De La Rosa continues as interim director of the Presbyterian Mission Agency. Look for great things, in particular, from J. Herbert Nelson. He’s a powerful orator in the tradition of Martin Luther King, Jr. and a change-agent. While he has never been a stated clerk before at any level, he promises to be a quick study.

2) The Assembly approved a draft of a new Directory for Worship that will now go out to the presbyteries for approval. The changes have to do mostly with making the Directory for Worship more concise and usable, although it does offer new flexibility to welcome unbaptized inquirers to the Lord’s Table, as long as the invitation to be baptized is made clear to them.

1) And now, the number-one thing this Assembly did was to complete the process of adding the Belhar Confession as the twelfth confessional document contained in the Book of Confessions. While this was pretty much a foregone conclusion — since more than three-fourths of the presbyteries have already given their required assent — still, it is of great historic significance. After the positive vote, theologian Allan Boesak of South Africa, one of the authors of the Belhar Confession during the apartheid era, addressed the Assembly. He ended his remarks by saying, “We may not know what tomorrow may bring, but I know this: tonight, we have overcome. I know this: because of Jesus, we shall overcome. I know this: whatever may come in our world, we shall overcome.” In a moving moment, the Assembly responded by spontaneously breaking into song, singing — what else? —“We Shall Overcome.”

Origins of the Old Tennent Church

I subscribe to a Presbyterian History blog written by a man named David Myers, a minister in the Presbyterian Church in America. His posts dealing with the history of that conservative breakaway denomination are of little interest to me, but he does write frequently about our common history: particularly the Colonial era. I find those posts to be of much greater interest.

Imagine my surprise when I opened an email today and found that the subject of his latest historical reflection is the Old Tennent Church!

You can find his blog post on Old Tennent here.

Towards the end of the article David does say he wishes this historic congregation were a member of the PCA. (Sorry, David. We're proud, here in Monmouth Presbytery, that Old Tennent is one of our congregations, and has been such since the day our Presbytery was founded.)

"Take a Chill Pill," Says This Canadian Pastor

There's been a lot of Chicken Little talk among PC(USA) folk in recent years. Church membership has been declining for decades, and worship attendance as well (although not so rapidly).  Add to that some clueless news coverage - like the "death of the Church" articles that followed the Pew Research Report, "America's Changing Religious Landscape," of about a year ago - and some of us are left wondering if, one day, we may be the proverbial last ones left to turn off the lights.

Well, Mark Twain was a Presbyterian, so I guess his church is entitled to borrow his famous line, "Reports of my death are greatly exaggerated."

Recently I ran across a blog post by a Canadian pastor, Erik Parker. He wrote it about a year ago, in response to the hand-wringing of his neighbors south of the border. It's one of the most insightful reflections I've ever read, explaining our changed circumstances as the church in a rapidly secularizing culture.

Take a chill pill, he's saying to us. You forget, we Canadians are ahead of you when it comes to dealing with the effects of secularization. Sure, the church is changing, but it's not - I repeat - it's NOT dying. Or, if it is, it's the sort of fruitful dying that prepares the way for rebirth.

That's a paraphrase. What he does say, in broad outline - and you should read his column for the full story - is:

1. The Golden Era of Church attendance in the 1950s was the abnormality.  

2. What we are seeing is the death of Christendom… not the Church. 

3. We like to think that we are the ones who can finally do the church in. (We shouldn't flatter ourselves; it's Christ's church, not ours.)

My formative childhood experiences of church took place in the Eisenhower, Kennedy and Johnson presidencies. I can still recall walking down the sidewalk with my family to the old Presbyterian Church of Toms River (the one that became the County Library headquarters, after the congregation relocated to a larger building). My mother wore white gloves and a pert little Sunday hat. My father wore a dapper Mad Men suit. My brother Jim and I were outfitted with clip-on bow ties and crew cuts. It was all very Mayberry.

Everybody who was anybody in our little town went to church or synagogue on Sundays - if not our Presbyterian Church, then one of the other houses of worship. It was just what you did.

As I grew up, going to college and seminary, then eventually returning to Ocean County to pastor another congregation, I had a ringside seat to view the great decline of American civil religion. I didn't know it at the time, but that's exactly what was happening.

I remember the time, a few years into my ministry in Point Pleasant, when a bunch of us pastors got together to lobby the leaders of the local Pop Warner football league. We were trying to get them to move their games to a time other than Sunday mornings, so parents wouldn't have to choose between Sunday School and sports for their children. That sort of scheduling would never have happened when I was a kid of pee-wee football age. It wouldn't even have been considered. We got absolutely nowhere with those football dads, for whom elusive dreams of college scholarships for their kids trumped any value that could come of belonging to a church. We didn't know it when we walked into that room, but we had lost the battle before the conversation even began.

Erik Parker, and other Canadian pastors, have been through this transition already - the transition to to a church without the secular props we have come to depend on for so long. We're panicking, he reassures us, "about a society and culture that is no longer evangelizing for us." That's all. We've had it soft for a very long time, and now we've got to start pulling our own weight: as the church has always done, through most of its history.

Most of us long-experienced pastors have never known anything different. Today's Millennial pastors are graduating from seminary with wholly different expectations.

Is that a good thing or a bad thing? It does, evidently, appear to be God's thing, so who am I to complain?

The Lost Art of Consensus

Ever been in a meeting where not everyone was in agreement?

We all have. It can be an uncomfortable experience, but it's a part of living and working together in a church or other community.

What makes the difference, in such a situation, is not how we go into the meeting.

It's how we come out of it.

If we come out of the meeting with a consensus, we feel like we've accomplished something, and rightfully so.

Consensus and unanimity are not the same thing, as church consultant Susan Beaumont affirms in a noteworthy online article, "The Truth about Consensus," that's well worth clicking through to read. (More on that in a moment.)

Sometimes groups decide to set aside Robert's Rules of Order for a time, in order to make a decision "by consensus." What people mean by that vague phrase is baffling - especially because the whole purpose of Robert's Rules is to achieve consensus.

It's important to be clear, up-front, on what we mean by the word. My Shorter Oxford English Dictionary defines consensus as "Agreement or unity of or of opinion, testimony, etc.; the majority view, a collective opinion; (an agreement by different parties to) a shared body of views."

Consensus is closely related to "consent." Now, we all know that to give consent to something is not the same as giving wholehearted affirmation. If a father hands over the car keys to his teenage daughter, it's true he's giving consent to her using the car that evening, but he may not be wholeheartedly in favor of the idea. He may sit up late with the porch light on, anxiously awaiting her return. But Dad's given his consent, so he's not going to stand at the foot of the driveway and prevent her from backing out.

Beaumont insightfully points out that, when many people talk about achieving consensus, they're not really talking about consensus at all. They're talking about unanimity, which is different:

"True consensus is achieved when every person involved in the decision can say: 'I believe this is the best decision we can arrive at for the organization at this time, and I will support its implementation.' In contrast, unanimity is undivided opinion. Everyone is in agreement on the best course of action to take. The difference is subtle but important. When we strive for unanimity, we end up taking an inordinate amount of time to make decisions. At best, innovation grinds to a halt. At worst, we create unhealthy patterns of interaction where people are pressured to acquiesce on important issues."

It's those unhealthy patterns of interaction that concern me. They can be subtle.

Setting aside Robert's Rules for alternative models of decision-making is in vogue in many parts of the church today. "Open space technology," "the World Cafe," and other modes of decision-making are popular options in presbytery meetings.

Such processes certainly have their advantages. They allow members who aren't so skilled in parliamentary procedure to voice their opinions. They allow introverts to shine. They provide highly visual polling methods that allow for reality-checks at key stages of the process. They also leave room for creative, even artistic, means of exploring very complex issues. Yet, applied unsparingly and without careful monitoring, they can also open the way to subtle manipulation of the group.

Here's how such manipulation can happen. Let's say a group suspends the rules and decides to spend some time sitting around tables talking about an issue. The moderator speaks rhapsodically about the virtues of unity, and how wonderful it would be if everyone could achieve a common mind during this interlude The instructions are that each table is to come up with a "consensus" recommendation and report it to the larger group. Let's also say that, at each table of four, there are three people who tend to favor Option A and one who favors Option B.

They get to talking, and at each table, the person who favors Option B feels very much alone. Mindful of the moderator's encouragement to strive for a common mind, the "B" person falls silent. Each table reports a decision to support Option A, and everyone marvels that the decision was made so easily.

That is, until some of the pro-B people get to talking afterwards, out in the parking lot, and realize they were not in such a small minority as they'd imagined. Had the rules not been suspended, more of them would have spoken up about it in debate, found strength in numbers, and could possibly have swayed enough pro-A people to change their minds that there would have been a different outcome. At the very least, they might have proposed an amendment or two that would have altered Option A to make it more to their liking.

The problem, Beaumont writes, is that many people confuse the meanings of "consensus" and "unanimity." When many use the word "consensus," what they're really hoping to achieve is unanimity, 100% agreement.

True unanimity is rare. It does not consist in the naysayers falling silent, because they've already heard the many voices in favor and have figured out in advance how the vote's going to come out.

Beaumont makes this helpful distinction:

"According to Larry Dressler, 'Consensus is a cooperative process in which all group members develop and agree to support a decision that is in the best interest of the whole. In consensus, the input of every member is carefully considered and there is a good faith effort to address all legitimate concerns.'

Consensus is not the same thing as a unanimous decision, in which all group members’ personal preferences are satisfied. Consensus is also not a majority vote, in which some larger segment of the group gets to make the decision. Consensus is not a coercive or manipulative tactic to get members to conform to some preordained decision.

In testing for consensus you are not asking: Is this your first choice of options? Do you like this option? Does this option satisfy your personal needs? In testing for consensus you are asking: Is this an option that I can live with and ultimately support? Does this option satisfy the criteria that we have claimed as a group? Will this option adequately serve the best interest of our congregation and its stakeholders?

Simply agreeing with a decision is not true consensus. Consensus implies commitment to the decision, which means that you oblige yourself to do your part in putting the decision into action."

There's one place where I disagree with Beaumont, as excellent as her article is in every other respect. She has a singularly low opinion of majority voting as a decision-making method. Having articulated the difference between consensus and unanimity, she still views majority voting as, ultimately, a failure of consensus-building.

When consensus-building fails, she recommends four possible options:

"(1) Defer the decision...,(2) Dissolve the group...., (3) Give decision making authority to a sub-group...., or (4), Default to a majority vote."

She describes this fourth option as follows:

"The group can decide, in advance, on a point in time where consensus seeking will end. If you have not reached consensus by that point in time, the group will vote and the decision will be determined by the majority."

This, in fact, happens under Robert's Rules by either passing a motion to fix a time at which to vote (in other words, docketing a vote to take place at a particular time) or by voting to "move the previous question," thus ending debate.

But - and here's my quarrel with her reasoning - why is this sort of outcome a mere "default"?  Isn't a majority vote, following spirited debate, in fact an excellent means of achieving consensus - as that word is truly and accurately defined?

I believe it is. Consensus means trusting the group enough to be on the losing side of a vote and still support the decision.

The trend in our larger society is against consensus of any kind, to see it as a failure of one's own argument and therefore to be be resisted at all costs. It's precisely the loss of the art of consensus that is bedeviling the Congress of the United States in these days of partisan polarization.

Let's not be that way in the church of Jesus Christ. Let us remember how blessed it can be to agree to disagree. Let us honor true consensus as a mark of Christian unity.

Bossism in the Presbyterian Church?

By sheer chance, searching for something else in the New York Times online archive, I came across the article reprinted below. Although it sounds like an editorial, it was located in and amongst the regular news articles. (I'm not sure newspapers made a very sharp distinction between editorial and news content back in 1896.)

The subject is "Bossism in the Presbyterian Church." The writer makes the case that the General Assembly is easily manipulated by its own staff, and that its decision-making processes make it difficult for the commissioners elected by the presbyteries to influence the outcome.

What's remarkable to me is that the argument is strikingly similar to that being advanced by proponents of the "Foothills Overtures" that will be up for consideration by this summer's General Assembly, calling for more controls on any one Assembly's power to make decisions.

But here's the thing: the author of the article, who's sympathetic to the liberal wing of the church, is complaining that it's the conservatives who benefit from the way the Assembly does things! (This is the polar opposite of the situation with this year's Foothills Overtures, which have been advanced by disaffected conservatives who are upset with the Assembly's social-justice pronouncements.)

The "bossism" charge is, of course, an allusion to New York City's notorious Tammany Hall political machine, then in its full manipulative glory. The Assembly's then-Stated Clerk, the Rev. W.H. Roberts - who served in that post for 36 years - is cast in the role of Boss Tweed.

The issue in question is the notorious Briggs Case, by which an earlier Assembly had judged Professor Charles Briggs of Union Theological Seminary in New York a heretic, on account of his un-fundamentalist approach to scripture (Briggs was a noted professor of Old Testament; the "Brown-Driver-Briggs" Hebrew lexicon, of which he was a principal author, is still in wide use today).

"The more things change, the more they stay the same," as the old French proverb goes.

It's been well over a century that the complaint about staff domination of the General Assembly has been raised. I suppose one could respond by saying that, 120 years later, it's high time the General Assembly made some changes!

On the other hand, one could respond by observing that this complaint is merely a perennial "sour grapes" reaction on the part of Presbyterians who disagree with decisions the General Assembly has made.

You decide.

New York Times, May 18, 1896, p. 4.

Bossism in the Presbyterian Church

Professor Charles Briggs

The General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church meets this week at Saratoga. The result of its action will be watched with interest and some anxiety by those who dread what they consider the undue centralisation of power in the Assembly. Originally the Assembly busied itself chiefly with the broader interests of the Church: its missions, home and foreign, and its inter-denominational relations. Of late it has asserted itself more and more in matters hitherto considered the special prerogatives of the lower courts. It constituted itself a heresy court, and made manifestoes on the most abstruse topics of theology. Then, finding that its dictation was not relished by the seminaries, it attacked them and sought to dominate not only their orthodoxy, but their financial administration. Having succeeded in some measure, it has of late sought still further extension of its power. The condemnation of Prof. Briggs logically resulted in the withdrawal of Church recognition from the institution with which he was connected, and which steadily supported him. This, however, was soon seen to be of very little moment. Union Seminary continued on its way, received students under its instruction, and sent them to the Presbyteries for examination on the same basis as did the various Congregationalist, Methodist, and other theological schools. They were received or not, according to their individual opinions, without regard to the source of those opinions. The sharpest examinations failed to discover traces of heresy in them, and there seemed to be danger lest the ground gained in the condemnation of the Professor should be lost by the indorsement of the students. The conservatives hit upon a plan, which they carried through in a way worthy of the methods by which New-York has been governed politically, and “jammed through” the Presbytery of this city an apparently harmless question, addressed to the Assembly, as to what was the Presbytery’s duty in regard to the students. With the Assembly entirely under their control, it was not difficult to get an “injunction” against receiving the students.

The boycott seemed to be complete. But this was a longer step than some even of the conservatives were willing to take. They began to realize that the dominating power of the Assembly, with which they had no fault to find so long as it affected simply men with whom they did not agree, was being extended over one of their most ancient rights and privileges, the right of judgment as to the qualifications of candidates for the ministry as well as authority over ministers. Were the Assembly a continuous body, or had it even as much of continuity as Congress, it would be different. It is, however, in fact a popular convention, largely composed of men, both ministers and laymen accustomed to rule, of procedure, and absolutely at the mercy of skillful tacticians, as has been repeatedly evident in the past few years. Some of the strongest conservatives in several Presbyteries, therefore, have joined hands with liberals in the right of judgment as to the qualifications of candidates for the ministry, as well as authority over them after ordination.

Stated Clerk William Henry Roberts

The situation is complicated by the peculiar constitution of the Assembly and the fact that it is largely under the control of one man. The Stated Clerk of the Assembly has by virtue of his position peculiar influence. He is in charge of the general statistics of the Church, gives notification of all action of the Assembly, is Secretary of all hold-over committees, and in general has to do with everything and everybody. The present Stated Clerk Is the Rev. W. H. Roberts, D.D., of Philadelphia. He has magnified his office. For several years he has carefully manipulated the different Assemblies. He has selected the Moderators and then acted as their adviser. He has nominated the committees, drawn up the legislation, pulled wires for his favorite benevolences, let recalcitrant seminaries and unruly Presbyteries feel the weight of his displeasure, and in general comported himself exactly as any political boss.

Here is really the most serious element in the situation. Natural conservatism is amenable to influence and increasing knowledge. Bossism allows no influence of any kind. The Presbyterian Church is a great power in the land, in its wealth, its education, its intelligence. If it could during the next two weeks throw overboard the influences that have been checking it, and declare for the right of men to do their own thinking and come to their own conclusions, untrammeled by ecclesiastical bosses, it would be a great thing for the Church.

(Photos are not from the original Times article.)

Godly Vision

George Bullard is a church-leadership consultant. In a recent column, he has some very helpful comments on the sort of vision Christian leaders need to cultivate, in order to be most effective in serving God.

He begins by highlighting the sort of vision commonly practiced by many church leaders, which is little more then warmed-over tips from secular management literature:

"Leaders — even in Christian congregations — approach vision like church is an organization, a sports team or their country. It is about winning. It is about reaching tangible goals in the short-term. They cannot divide the success they see in the world around them from the success only God can offer.

This translates in everyday life for many congregations as a numerical measurement. Vision is a growing membership and attendance. Vision is program events that are wildly successful. Vision is surpassing the budget. Vision is filling the worship center. Vision is a full schedule of ministries. The source of these visions is our own pride."

In order to practice godly vision, we need to be in relationship with God. That means more than lip-service, or slapping "I love God" stickers on the bumper of the car. It means getting serious about spiritual discernment.

Bullard also makes the point that congregational visioning is a long-term process. No quick fixes. No handy-dandy questionnaires:

"Vision is not about quick results. Its fulfillment does not have to be fast. It is a commitment over a long period of time. Vision is not about what we will do this year. That is focusing on tactics. Vision is not about the next one to three years. That is focusing on strategies. Vision is about the long-term.

Vision is about changed behavior that develops in congregations over a period of years, and becomes hardwired in the Christ-centered, faith-based culture of the congregation."

There are things - good things, in many cases - that can get in the way of faithful visioning in congregations. Like the American flag in the sanctuary (full disclosure: we have one in our sanctuary - as pastor, I've chosen not to fight that particular battle, though I know it can be mildly idolatrous).

There's a whole raft of secularist assumptions related to money that likewise creep into congregational life: like the judgment that high-rolling big contributors are the people churches ought to be seeking out as members. Of course the church needs money to operate, but if money were the be-all and end-all, then the most successful church would be the one wealthy enough to hire employees to do all the work (hardly the sort of foot-washing servanthood taught by our Lord).

I think we also wander far afield from the Great Commission when we imagine that our goal in attracting new members is to replicate ourselves, to find more nice people like us to sit in our pews. In my experience it's people who stand out from the herd and bring gifts no one else can offer who have an outsized impact on the mission of a congregation.

If there's one thing Superstorm Sandy has taught our church in the coastal town of Point Pleasant Beach, New Jersey, it's that the church is most effectively the church when we're doing mission ourselves. I have the feeling we were more authentically the church cooking food on our gas stove for the neighborhood, on those dark nights when nobody had electricity, than we've been while cooking any number of fellowship meals since (not that I'm knocking congregational fellowship, which is important in its own way - it's just not the main thing).

Finally, as Bullard makes clear, God is not in the reassurance business. God's in the transformation business:

"To be captivated by God’s vision is a paradigm shift. When such a shift occurs then everything goes back to zero....

When our church buildings, our unwillingness to take a stand for where God is leading us, and the pride we feel in our heritage are in conflict with God’s transformative vision, too many congregations reject God’s vision. They want change they can see and immediately measure. That is a transactional vision. God’s transformational vision is unseen and long-term."


Amen.

Join the Churchwide Conversation

What does it mean to be Presbyterian? Who is the church called to be in this current day and time? How should the denomination serve into the future?

There's been much turmoil and hand-wringing in the PC(USA) of late. While some have rejoiced in the last General Assembly's decision to remove impediments to the celebration of same-sex marriages - but only for those ministers and congregations who feel called to do so - others have not been happy with that decision. There's talk of congregations leaving (with the permission of their presbyteries, of course, because that's how it has to happen in our system of government).  There's also talk of staying within the denomination, but in a dissenting way.

In preparation for the next General Assembly (June 18–25, 2016, in Portland, Oregon), the Office of the General Assembly has issued a call for churchwide conversation on where the Lord is leading the PC(USA).

These discussions, which will focus around denominational identity, will take place both online and in-person, in groups that will be forming around the church.

The process begins on October 23, with an invitation to go online to share thoughts and comments. Those who are interested in being a part of these online conversations are invited to sign up here.

“We’re inviting Presbyterians to dream big dreams, hope big hopes, and share them with their brothers and sisters,” says Margaret Elliott, moderator of the Committee on the Office of the General Assembly. “The fruit of that dialogue will then be used by the General Assembly — an expression of the church’s core — when it gathers. Together the body will discern a way forward for the church."

Undoubtedly, we'll be organizing some dialogue groups here in Monmouth Presbytery, For now, however, signing up for the online process is a great place to start.

Thornwell's Revenge?

A collection of overtures sent by South Carolina’s Foothills Presbytery to next summer’s General Assembly is attracting a lot of buzz. Some remarks are favorable, but the vast majority of reactions I’ve heard are negative.

Given that the professed intention of the overtures is to streamline and systematize the Assembly’s ponderous and sometimes chaotic docket — a common source of complaints, voiced especially by first-time commissioners — then why the skepticism about these overtures?

It’s because, to many observers, the Foothills overtures seem to mask a darker intention. The friendly- and benign-sounding goal of taming the Assembly’s docket hides a deeply reactionary goal of stifling nearly all change and hobbling the Assembly’s ability to manage its own rules.

Here’s what the eight Foothills overtures do:

1) Devote each General Assembly to considering one of the six Great Ends of the Church (F-1.0304) on a rotating basis, considering in that year only matters that pertain to that Great End. Constitutional amendments could only be considered every third Assembly (which, with a biennial meeting schedule, means every six years). Even then, no amendment could be considered that has not achieved prior endorsement by 15% of the presbyteries.

2) Proposed social-witness policy statements must have the prior endorsement of one-third of the presbyteries.

3) For the next three General Assemblies, block the Assembly’s Advisory Committee on Social Witness Policy from proposing anything to the Assembly. The only way for that group to get any business before the Assembly would be for them to convince a sufficient number of presbyteries to generate overtures.

4) For each General Assembly, allow one-fifth of the presbyteries, on a rotating basis, to send their executive presbyter (or whomever most closely approximates that function, if they don’t have one) as an advisory delegate with voice.

5) Require a supermajority of two-thirds of the presbyteries to ratify any constitutional amendments, and require the next General Assembly to ratify any amendments that do gain that level of support, before they could become part of the Constitution.

6) Allow presbyteries to abstain from voting on proposed constitutional amendments (presently they may only vote “yes” or “no,” with any failure to vote being counted as a “no” vote).

7) Allow presbyteries and synods to overture the General Assembly to amend or suspend any of the General Assembly’s Standing Rules (presently they can do this by asking their elected commissioners to do so).

8) Presbyteries and synods may do the same for the Manual of the General Assembly.

In placing a contingent of presbytery executives on the floor of the Assembly as watchdogs (overture 4), and in giving presbyteries and synods control over the Assembly’s own rules (overtures 7 and 8), the Foothills overtures significantly weaken the Assembly’s ability to control its own destiny. In allowing presbyteries to dodge the responsibility of voting on constitutional amendments, overture 6 allows presbyteries to rudely ignore any amendment — notwithstanding the fact that the Assembly considered it important enough to ask presbyteries to vote on. In requiring a two-thirds supermajority for amendments, overture 5 embodies a deep fear of change.

Overtures 4 through 8, therefore, go way beyond mere conservatism to make the church captive to reactionary politics. They resuscitate, for the ecclesiastical context, the sort of States’ Rights and nullification procedures that the United States of America fought a Civil War to overcome.

As for overtures 1 through 3, these seek to summon, like the biblical Medium of Endor, a particularly scary ghost whom Presbyterians have not seen since the late 1800s: the ghost of James Henley Thornwell.

Thornwell was one of the church’s most brilliant theologians and would have been numbered among the greats, were it not for one fatal mistake on his part: he sullied his intellectual reputation by arguing vigorously for slavery as a biblically-sanctioned institution. He did so by promoting a deeply-flawed theological principle he called “the Spirituality of the Church.”

By this, Thornwell meant that the church ought to consider only “spiritual” matters. Because he considered slavery a legal rather than a spiritual matter, he believed the church had no business even talking about it. Such decisions belonged to secular government. Church councils — be they presbyteries, synods or the General Assembly — did best by avoiding such topics altogether.

Thornwell would have made a lousy Old Testament prophet.

The first three of the Foothills overtures sound like pages torn from Thornwell’s polity playbook. They treat social witness policy — as the mid-nineteenth-century Southern Presbyterians treated slavery — like some malodorous topic that doesn’t belong in polite ecclesiastical society. While recognizing that, every once in a while, the church may have no choice but to address such “unspiritual” matters (holding its nose all the while), they so limit the church’s ability to do so that Presbyterians would rarely, if ever, be able to speak truth to power.

It’s incredible to me that, in the twenty-first century, States’ Rights and “Spirituality of the Church” principles like these could gain traction in any segment of the PC(USA).

The Assembly will of course give them due consideration. It's the Presbyterian way.

A Quick Guide to Parliamentary Procedure

In case you're wondering, this distinguished personage is Henry Martyn Robert. Besides being a guy with three first names, why do you suppose he deserves a place on this blog?

Why, because he's the Robert of Robert's Rules of Order, of course!

Most people don't know that Robert was a Colonel in the U.S. Army and a member of the Corps of Engineers who served in the Civil War (later he was promoted to General). The experience that led him to set down in exhaustive detail a set of rules for parliamentary meetings had nothing to do with the military. It took place in a church setting.

Specifically, it was a raucous congregational meeting that got out of hand. An engineer like Robert, who surely had a passion for keeping things in good order, would have been especially troubled by the chaos.

In case you're wondering, it wasn't a Presbyterian church. Robert was a Baptist.

So, Robert's Rules were actually birthed in the church --- although the good Colonel based them, loosely, on the rules of the U.S. Congress, which in turn were inspired by the British Parliament.

If you've ever picked up a copy of the full Robert's Rules - the complete version, not one of the many abridged versions out there - you've surely been impressed by how dense and incomprehensible it seems. It's a real brick of a book. Here's the cover of the first edition, from 1878.

The book is periodically revised by Robert's descendants, who own the rights to it. The most recent edition contains rules for some situations the venerable parliamentarian could never have imagined - like electronic meetings.

Fortunately, most elders - ruling as well as teaching - don't need to master all those procedural intricacies. A number of simplified versions are out there, that should be more than adequate for most situations that come up in a session or congregational meeting.

If you want a really abbreviated version, Therese Howells, a fellow stated clerk, has just put up a helpful article on the PC(USA) website. She hits most of the high points.

Read, mark and inwardly digest her simplified list of motions, and you'll be well on your way to engaging in church government for fun and profit (the profit being of the non-pecuniary variety).

The Marriage Amendment and Mutual Forbearance

It’s only a matter of time.

Anyone who’s been monitoring the count of presbyteries voting on Constitutional Amendment 14-F, allowing same-sex marriage in Presbyterian churches, can see the tally's been running nearly two-to-one in favor. It’s almost a mathematical certainty that, in the coming weeks, we’ll hear the news that the required minimum of 86 ratifying presbyteries has been reached. The Directory for Worship will have been amended, to define marriage as “a unique commitment between two people, traditionally a man and a woman, to love and support each other for the rest of their lives.” (The full text of the amended section can be found below.)

“So, what happens then?” That’s the question on the minds of many Presbyterians.

For more than 40 years, Presbyterians have been debating the question of full inclusion of gays and lesbians in the life of the church. That theological struggle has been going on for longer than I’ve been in ministry. With each year that’s gone by, the number of Presbyterians favoring full inclusion has gradually been increasing, a slowly rising tide.

Three years ago, a majority of presbyteries agreed with the General Assembly, voting to remove the constitutional bar to ordination for those who do not “live either in fidelity within the covenant of marriage between a man and a woman, or chastity in singleness.”

A year ago, the Assembly voted to recommend changing the definition of marriage from being “between a man and a woman” to being “between two people” (although noting that the two parties have traditionally been a man and a woman).

In large part, the rising tide of change has been generationally-driven. Pollsters tell us huge majorities of 30-and-under Christians do not view same-sex relationships as inherently sinful — and that most of them have little interest in any church that teaches differently. As younger people have been elected as commissioners to presbyteries, and as a corresponding number of older leaders have aged out, the shift has gradually taken place. There’s an old saying that “the church is always just one generation away from extinction.” From a purely demographic standpoint, it’s hard to see how any church that favors moral convictions more common to retirees than to younger and mid-life adults can survive for long.

Although there’s sometimes a tendency for those on the conservative side of the debate to dismiss the convictions of their opponents as unbiblical, anyone who takes an objective look at the arguments pro and con will see that it’s not a matter of biblical fidelity, but rather of differing biblical interpretations. Advocates of same-sex marriage truly do not love their Bibles any less than those who oppose it. They just understand the scriptures differently.

The new language doesn’t force any Presbyterians to change their views. It is permissive, not mandatory, speaking of what “may be appropriate” rather than what must happen. More than that, it offers explicit protection for any teaching elder (minister) or congregation who fears being forced to approve a same-sex marriage ceremony: “Nothing herein shall compel a teaching elder to perform nor compel a session to authorize the use of church property for a marriage service that the teaching elder or the session believes is contrary to the teaching elder’s or the session’s discernment of the Holy Spirit and their understanding of the Word of God.” Individual conscience is protected.

Well, what about those who feel offended that they must live under a Book of Order that even tolerates same-sex marriage? 

The answer to that is that the Book of Order is not a confession of faith. Those ordained to ordered ministry in the Presbyterian Church don’t swear allegiance to the Book of Order (they don’t even do that for individual passages from the Book of Confessions: in the ordination questions, they promise not to subscribe to individual confessions word-for-word, but rather to “be instructed and led” by the entire collection of confessional documents). What they do promise, in the ordination questions, is to “be governed by our church’s polity” and to “abide by its discipline.”

There’s a subtle — but important —  difference between affirming a constitutional document and agreeing to be governed by it. After the marriage amendment takes effect — with its explicit guarantee that no one in ordered ministry will be forced to participate in a same-sex ceremony — there will be nothing in the Book of Order to force pastors or session members to affirm or do anything against their consciences, when it comes to same-sex marriage ceremonies.

There is, however, something of great importance the Book of Order does expect every Presbyterian leader to do: and this has certainly not changed. This obligation, expressed in our Historic Principles of Church Order for over 200 years, is to strive to exercise “mutual forbearance” towards fellow presbyters whose viewpoints differ from our own (F-3.0105).

And what is mutual forbearance? It’s a biblical concept — although it’s a little hard to locate in most English translations, because the word “forbearance” is something of an antique.  Scrupulous readers of the Authorized (“King James”) Version will recognize it in Ephesians 4:2. In the face of persistent church conflict, Paul’s prescription for good health in the body of Christ is “forbearing one another in love, endeavoring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.” The New Revised Standard Version renders it “bearing with one another in love.”

The essential feature of the biblical concept of mutual forbearance is the presence of a third party in the relationship: God. Whether the opposing parties are facing off across a kitchen table or a Session conference table, two individuals in conflict have little chance of permanently resolving their differences unless they first acknowledge their mutual reliance on a higher authority. Such is the message of the Ephesians passage as it recommends “making every effort to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.”

Note that unity in the relationship does not come from the parties themselves. It is unity of the Spirit. Further, the peace that reigns over the two opponents is not something that appears automatically, requiring little effort. The scripture speaks of the “bond” of peace: literally, a chain or fetter. A lifelong commitment to living and working with one another, despite our differences, means sacrificing something of the freedom we would otherwise have, were we not accountable to another.

It’s not unlike living through change as a family. Change does not typically happen, in families, in slow and incremental ways. It happens by leaps and bounds, often driven by the passions of the younger generations, to which the older members eventually learn to accommodate. The younger generations, for their part, come to accept the likelihood that they will never fully convince their elders.

What happens, then? Does the family splinter, its unity destroyed?

Sadly, in some cases this is what happens. Most observers, though, would describe that as a failed family. Its members have failed to do the one thing they were expected to do: to stick together through thick and thin.

What keeps any family healthy and strong is mutual forbearance. It must be intentional, and it must happen on both sides. We bear with each other because we love one another in Christ. That’s the bottom line.

So, what will happen after the new constitutional language becomes the law of the church? My hope is that together we will enter a new period of mutual forbearance, coming to appreciate the theological and practical value of this historical — and deeply biblical — principle of Presbyterianism.

(The description of mutual forbearance is adapted from my forthcoming book, tentatively titled Principles of Presbyterian Polity, that is under contract with Westminster/John Knox Press.)

Amendment 14-F. Marriage

On Amending W-4.9000

Marriage is a gift God has given to all humankind for the well-being of the entire human family. Marriage involves a unique commitment between two people, traditionally a man and a woman, to love and support each other for the rest of their lives. The sacrificial love that unites the couple sustains them as faithful and responsible members of the church and the wider community.

In civil law, marriage is a contract that recognizes the rights and obligations of the married couple in society. In the Reformed tradition, marriage is also a covenant in which God has an active part, and which the community of faith publicly witnesses and acknowledges.

If they meet the requirements of the civil jurisdiction in which they intend to marry, a couple may request that a service of Christian marriage be conducted by a teaching elder in the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), who is authorized, though not required, to act as an agent of the civil jurisdiction in recording the marriage contract. A couple requesting a service of Christian marriage shall receive instruction from the teaching elder, who may agree to the couple’s request only if, in the judgment of the teaching elder, the couple demonstrate sufficient understanding of the nature of the marriage covenant and commitment to living their lives together according to its values. In making this decision, the teaching elder may seek the counsel of the session, which has authority to permit or deny the use of church property for a marriage service.

The marriage service shall be conducted in a manner appropriate to this covenant and to the forms of Reformed worship, under the direction of the teaching elder and the supervision of the session (W-1.4004–.4006). In a service of marriage, the couple marry each other by exchanging mutual promises. The teaching elder witnesses the couple’s promises and pronounces God’s blessing upon their union. The community of faith pledges to support the couple in upholding their promises; prayers may be offered for the couple, for the communities that support them, and for all who seek to live in faithfulness.

A service of worship recognizing a civil marriage and confirming it in the community of faith may be appropriate when requested by the couple. The service will be similar to the marriage service except that the statements made shall reflect the fact that the couple is already married to one another according to the laws of the civil jurisdiction.

Nothing herein shall compel a teaching elder to perform nor compel a session to authorize the use of church property for a marriage service that the teaching elder or the session believes is contrary to the teaching elder’s or the session’s discernment of the Holy Spirit and their understanding of the Word of God.

Photo credits: Rodrigo Valladares, Stephen Eastop, from freeimages.com

What You Need Is a Cup

We had an interesting time last night in the Presbyterian Polity course I teach at New Brunswick Theological Seminary. I’d handed out a review by Anthony B. Robinson from a recent issue of The Christian Century of sociologist Nancy Ammerman’s book, Sacred Stories, Spiritual Tribes (Oxford, 2013). One of the things Ammerman does is assess the category of people who describe themselves as SBNR (“spiritual but not religious”).

That category is, Ammerman asserts, “a unicorn” — something you never see in the wild. A major sociological research project she’s conducted demonstrates that people who are active in organized religion are the “most committed to spiritual practices and a spiritual view of the world.”

As for those who claim the SBNR label for themselves, rejecting organized religion, Ammerman found that (as a group, on the average) they’re not really very spiritual either — at least not according to the evidence she, as a sociologist, can objectively measure. Mostly, she speculates, the SBNR language is a way to lay down boundaries so as not to have to discuss religious questions with churchgoers. It’s a subtle way of saying, “Don’t bug me.”

From The Christian Century’s review: “To sum up her team’s findings, one might say that with a congregation a person is more likely to be spiritual, and without such a community of spiritual discourse and practice, individuals tend to be less spiritual or not spiritual at all. ‘The people with the most robust sense of sacred presence are those who participate in religious activities that allow for conversation and relationship,’ concludes the author.”

The class received and thoughtfully commented on the book review. Then, a little later, as we were discussing a recent PC(USA) ordination-exam question, our discussion got very lively. In the case study that's at the heart of that exam question, a man asks, “Pastor, does someone need to be a member of a church in order to be a good Christian?”

The question, of course, goes to the heart of the whole SBNR phenomenon. Some members of the class defended church involvement as essential to Christian discipleship. Others were not so sure. Some of these spoke poignantly of people they’ve known who feel grievously hurt by the church, having been excluded from full participation for one reason or another. Regretfully, they keep their distance.

Historically, we Presbyterians display a “high” conception of the church, holding up the importance of Christian community - including regular worship - as essential to the Christian life. We also observe that nearly everybody Jesus heals, in the Bible, either sticks around to join his band of disciples or goes back to rejoin their original community, telling of what they’ve heard, seen and experienced.

Jesus calls people not into private, do-it-yourself spirituality, but directly into community.

One of the students pointed out a line from the Book of Order's section, "The Meaning of Membership and Baptism," that says: "In Jesus Christ, God calls people to faith and to membership in the church, the body of Christ" (G-1.0301). That's an "and," not an "or." The two are bound together.

"Good eye," I said to her, commending her for picking out that passage. (I love it when they do that.)

I liken it to taking a drink of water — even “living water,” to apply a metaphor Jesus uses in the scriptures. Anyone who’s ever been out camping in the wilderness knows it’s possible to kneel down beside a stream, cup one’s hands and take a drink.

It’s far easier, of course, if you have a cup. Try to drink without one, and you only get one small swallow at a time. The greater part of the water you scoop up will leak out through your fingers. If you have a cup, though, it’s very different. As a container for holding water, a cup is far more efficient than the hands.

Even the language we use reflects that. When we speak of “cupping” our hands, we’re subtly pointing out that a cup (or similar drinking vessel) is the natural way to take a drink. When the hands try to do it, they’re aspiring to be a cup. They don’t do a very good job.

I see the church as like a cup that holds water. The cup itself is not what refreshes and sustains life. Only living water can do that. It’s far easier to drink of that living water, though, if we do make use of a cup. It is in community that we both learn how to practice the faith and receive the encouragement and support that enables us to actually do that.

Sadly, some people mistake the cup for the water it contains, and end up worshiping it instead. The cup, though, is not the point; the water is. But without a cup, we’re likely to be a lot thirstier.

Merry Christmas! (It's not an endangered expression)

We had a lively discussion at our last Session meeting about the words "Season's Greetings." One of our Presbyterian Women circles had hung a piece of poster board in the narthex for members to write Christmas greetings to one another. A few Session members thought it should be changed to "Merry Christmas."

They pointed out that a church, of all places, ought to be where people are perfectly comfortable using the word "Christmas."

I'm quite sure the PW member wrote "Season's Greetings" in all innocence. She could just as well have written "Merry Christmas." She had no idea she was stepping into the middle of an ongoing debate about the so-called "War on Christmas."

Is there such a "war?" I have my doubts. I think the whole concept of a War on Christmas is something TV pundits dreamed up in order to boost their ratings. Of course there are secular contexts, like department stores, that have to be mindful of their Hanukkah shoppers as well as their Christmas shoppers! Most reasonable people never thought this was a problem until some TV commentator told them it was.

A friend of mine, David Leininger, addressed this subject in a sermon circulated online. He says it better than I could, so I think I'll just let him speak for me:

It has always felt good for me to say [Merry Christmas]. And, to be honest, I never worried much about it. I have tried to be somewhat sensitive and not extend the wish to my Jewish or Muslim friends. That would have made no sense, but I have never felt particularly reluctant to say it. Have you?

What brings it to mind is this bizarre concern that some people have been supposedly feeling in recent years about being prevented from wishing folks, "Merry Christmas." Apparently, it all started when somebody on FOX News started a "Christmas Under Siege" campaign noting that many businesses were not wishing shoppers, "Merry Christmas" upon the completion of their transactions, but rather something innocuous and non-specific like, "Happy Holidays." The ultra-right wing John Birch Society said the same thing in the 1950s calling it a conspiracy concocted by the Godless United Nations. Not to be outdone, Focus on the Family's James Dobson started something called the Alliance Defense Fund running a project with the motto: "Merry Christmas. It's okay to say it." Jerry Falwell launched a "Friend or Foe Christmas Campaign," with promises to file suit against anyone who spread "misinformation" about how Christmas can be celebrated in schools and public spaces. He said he had 750 lawyers who were ready to pounce if, for example, a teacher were muzzled from leading the third graders in "Hark! The Herald Angels Sing." Of course, those 750 lawyers did not come cheap, so your tax-deductible contributions were most welcome to insure the success of this important venture.

One of the FOX News folks, John Gibson, even published a book called The War on Christmas: How the Liberal Plot to Ban the Sacred Christian Holiday Is Worse Than You Thought. Huh? I am a liberal, and proud of it, but the only thing I have ever plotted at Christmas is how to survive without going into bankruptcy.

Truth is, America has a complicated history with Christmas, going back to the Puritans, who despised it and considered the celebration un-Christian. The concern that Christmas distracted from religious piety continued even after Puritans faded away. In 1827, an Episcopal bishop lamented that the devil had stolen Christmas "and converted it into a day of worldly festivity, shooting, and swearing." 

Christmas began to gain popularity when it was transformed into a domestic celebration, after the publication of Clement Clarke Moore's Visit from St. Nicholas and Thomas Nast's drawings in Harper's Weekly that created the image of a white-bearded Santa who gave gifts to children. The new emphasis lessened religious leaders' worries that the holiday would be given over to drinking and shooting and swearing, but it introduced another concern: commercialism. And, we have been battling that ever since, with a notable lack of success -- and to the great relief of the nation's retailers who do their best business of the year just prior to Christmas.

These days, the "defenders" of Christmas are not just tolerating commercialization -- they are insisting upon it. Shop at the places that will wish you, "Merry Christmas," not just, "Happy Holidays."

Enough already! Christmas is just getting caught in the political crossfire. We are living in an America that, I am convinced, is not nearly so divided as some folks who have been exploiting us want us to believe. The vast majority of us agree on the vast majority of issues -- social, political, theological, whatever. There are some fringe issues about which we might disagree, but so what? We do not have to agree on everything to successfully live and work together -- ask any husband or wife. My advice is simply this: do not get caught up in these controversies. They are not worth it, they serve no purpose except to those who are trying to exploit them and us, and they certainly do not reflect well on us as Christians.

All I want for Christmas this year is grace -- just grace. The story of Christmas is, after all, at its heart, a story of grace. The coming of Jesus Christ into our world is the affirmation of God's unmerited favor to us. Look again at that little New Testament "postcard" (it's hardly long enough to be called something as highfalutin as an "epistle") to Titus: "For the grace of God that brings salvation ... Jesus ... has appeared to all ..." (Titus 2:11). Grace -- the essence of Christmas.

Alternate Utility Companies: Check Them Out Carefully

Here at Point Pleasant Presbyterian Church, we just received a visit from a congenial salesperson from an electricity provider that markets themselves as an alternative to Jersey Central Power & Light. She explained that her company, Gateway Energy Services, sends people like her around to check on what JCP&L is charging us, and to see if her employer can get us a better deal by providing a variable rate.

She explained that Gateway provides electricity wholesale to JCP&L and that we can save money by buying power directly from them. The discounts, she explained, would be "locked in" for two years.

While this was going on in the outer office, I started Googling "Gateway Energy Services" on my computer and quickly discovered a whole lot of consumer complaints. Some of them were related to "slamming" - changing a consumer's electricity provider when the consumer has not, in fact, agreed to do so. Others had to do with wildly varying rates, with those increases being absorbed by the consumer, not the company.

I'm no expert on these things, but it looks to me like this company would be inviting us to speculate with them on varying utility rates. Yes, they could save us money, under certain favorable conditions. Yet, if the conditions prove to be unfavorable, we - rather than they - would be assuming most of the financial risk.

I believe this is legal. But I also believe that, as business practices go, it's ethically questionable.

In the meantime, a church staff member had provided the salesperson with our JCP&L account number, which she entered into a tablet computer to show us the savings that would be possible.

We did not, in fact, agree to a change of service providers. We explained that the church staff does not have the power to make that kind of decision and asked the salesperson to provide a written proposal to submit to the appropriate Session committee. She grudgingly went out to her car and came back with an information sheet.

We subsequently called JCP&L and learned from them that, when a request comes to change a customer's service to an alternative energy company, their practice is to send the customer a letter, notifying the customer of the request. The customer then has seven days to get back to JCP&L and cancel the change before it goes into effect.

We'll wait and see what happens, but - based on what we've read about other customers' experience with this and similar alternative-energy companies - I think it's possible that we'll receive one of those JCP&L letters notifying us of a provider change request. We never agreed to that, but as long as the company has our JCP&L account number, they have the capacity to tell JCP&L that we made such a request.

We'll watch the mailbox and, should such a letter arrive, we'll immediately notify JCP&L that we have not authorized a change.

Should your church receive a visit or phone call from such a salesperson, my advice is to make no commitments, get everything in writing and not share with them your utility-company account number.

The New Jersey Board of Public Utilities has a helpful guide to shopping for energy providers, that includes a list of specific questions to ask before making this kind of decision.

Clerks, please pass this column along to your Session's finance or buildings and grounds person.

Caveat emptor....